girls

An essay on bots and poetry that is so good. “These days people are writing poems about fucking on volcanoes. ‘We fucked on a volcano.’ How does that help? How does it do anything to solve anything?” [n + 1 via The Paris Review]

The Whitney’s board of trustees has elected a new president, Richard M. DeMartini, and two new co-chairs, Laurie M. Tisch and Neil G. Bluhm. While Tisch has a background in the nonprofit sector—heading her own fund dedicated to increasing access to art education, economic opportunities, and healthy food—DeMartini and Bluhm are both from the world of finance. Bluhm had served as the board’s president since 2008 and is the founder and president of JMB Realty Corporation—a luxury real estate interest that at one point was the largest property developer in the United States. [ARTnews]

Thank you, Karen Archey, for bringing up Jackie Wullschlager’s recent article in the Financial Times. Writing about the Tate’s exhibitions of female modernists like Sonia Delaunay, Barbara Hepworth, and Agnes Martin, Wullschlager concludes: “Yet none delivers the visceral thrill or intellectual charge of a great retrospective, because none of these artists really changed how we see or think. Has a woman artist ever done so? The stories here show that female artists tend to assimilate and adapt radicality pioneered by men.” There is absolutely no way that you can prove that female artists have not changed the way we see or think or that they have assimilated and adapted radicality pioneered by men—scientific principles would be welcome in art history—not to mention that plenty of exhibitions have shown the influence of women in art. We don’t even know where to start, but let’s try Wack! Art and the Feminist Revolution. Sigh. [e-flux conversations]

A pair of paintings featuring the Confederate flag has gone on display at the Laguna Art Museum in Ocean County, California. In reference to the flag’s controversy and the wave of racial unrest sweeping the nation, the artist G. Ray Kerciu said, “I thought as an old man, we would be past all this stuff. But we’re not. It’s a great disappointment to me.” [Los Angeles Times]

While Greece’s economy is in a tailspin, artnet takes the time to notify us that there is absolutely no news about the troubled country’s under-construction Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center. [artnet News]

The Great Wall of China is disappearing. By some accounts, almost 30% of the structure has fallen victim to plundering, erosion, and neglect. People are freaking out. [The New York Times]

Hyperallergic’s Robin Grearson reviews Stay in New York, Art F City’s affordable workspace conference, and calls it a “crucial first step.” It’s a great summary for those who missed the conference. [Hyperallergic]

Jerry Saltz explains why everyone should be nicer to gallery attendants…with a picture of Marnie from HBO’s Girls. [Vulture]

WHOA! For the first time ever, the New York Rent Guidelines Board approved a freeze on one-year leases. There’s a couple of caveats to which leases will be affected, but this is historic. [Curbed NY]

Tuesday morning greetings. Time to bundle up! The Times reported temperatures of 4 degrees. That’s not gonna instantly turn boiling water into snow, but, you know, wear layers. And if you’ve got a spare coat, donate it to the New York Cares Coat Drive. They’re reporting a severe shortage of coats this year, and in this weather, people can’t afford to go without them.

It’s really cold out, so now we can declare this global warming fear mongering “bullshit”. Ah, Fox News, where would The Daily Show be without you? [The Daily Show]

It looks like MOCA is out of the woods, having met its goal to raise its endowment to $100 million and hopes to raise it to $150. It has yet to appoint a new director. [LA Times]

VICE has suggestions for making British art more interesting. High on the list: NO NEW AESTHETIC. [Vice]

Brooklyn real estate by the numbers. What do we learn? Architect Karl Fischer designed an astounding 50 new buildings in Williamsburg since 2002, making his vision and aesthetic for buildings the most dominant in the neighborhood. Also, Bed-Stuy is on the rise. [New York Magazine]

James Elkins has published an excerpt from his book North Atlantic Art History and Worldwide and asks, “Is art instruction global?”. The argument here is that homogeneous art instruction is a bad thing. I get that, but shouldn’t some basic instruction look pretty similar? What’s wrong with that? [Google docs]

Here’s an n+1 podcast for us; the latest looks at art world inequality and social practice. [n+1]

The New Yorker pans Gallery Girls for not being as good as Lena Dunham’s Girls. [The New Yorker]

We watched the Gallery Girls season premiere last night. So did the rest of the art world. Chloe Wyma, like Blake Gopnik, points out that so far, there’s been very little mention of actual art or artists, and a whole lot of focus on class warfare with the show’s “Jets-Sharks/Brooklyn-UES thing.” [ARTINFO]

Speaking of other “girls,” it’s worth mentioning that the show is just a drunker Mean Girls. [hereisafantasy]

Vice Presidential candidate Paul Ryan might not be as conservative as he’d like you to think: one of his favorite bands is Rage Against the Machine. In 2008, the band attempted to stage a protest show at the Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minnesota. [MTV]

Pussy Riot made their closing statements last week. Videos and statements from the trial show the three band members unafraid to continue their vocal dissent of Putin’s government. From Maria Alyokina’s closing statement: “Russia, as a state, has long resembled an organism sick to the core.” We’re still waiting for the final verdict. [Pussy Riot Trial]

New Orleans is bubbling with new projects like The Drop, a subscription service for limited-edition work by NOLA-based artists. It was started by the city’s newest art blog, Pelican Bomb. Kyle Chayka has the scoop on the NOLA scene, here. [ARTINFO]

Helen Gurley Brown, former Cosmopolitan editor-in-chief and author of Sex and the Single Girl, has passed away. She’s the one who coined the phrase: “Good girls go to heaven, bad girls go everywhere.” [The Atlantic Wire]